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Crews work to restore power to region

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Work to restore power continued Monday for West Penn Power customers in Washington, Greene and Fayette counties following Saturday’s heavy winds that hit the region.

Todd Meyers, West Penn Power spokesman, anticipated restoration to be complete by 11 p.m. Monday.

As of 1:30 p.m. Monday, West Penn Power was reporting 162 outages remained in Washington County, 102 in Greene and fewer than five in Fayette.

Wind gusts as high as 55 mph wreaked havoc through Western Pennsylvania Saturday, resulting in downed trees and electrical lines, knocking out power to 51,000 West Penn Power customers.

Meyers said nearly 500,000 customers of First Energy, of which West Penn Power is a subsidiary, were affected by the heavy winds, with about 300,000 of those in Ohio.

“It’s been a very large storm,” Meyers said. “We can see daylight at the end of the tunnel.”

Area fire companies were kept busy throughout the day.

Chris Richer, Washington Fire Department chief, said city crews responded to 11 service calls Saturday, mostly dealing with downed wires.

“That’s a higher percentage of calls for us than we typically have,” he said Monday.

The National Weather Service is calling for another wind system to hit the area on Wednesday.

However, meteorologist Lee Hendricks doesn’t expect the winds to cause the chaos that resulted Saturday, predicting gusts of up to 30 miles per hour.

“Nothing to get real excited about,” Hendricks said.

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